Memory
by x.WaitingForTheVan.x
Summary: There's really nothing special about my life, or any of us. We're just a bunch of monkeys trained in L's image, one's as good as another. Our memories are what make us individual,they make us who we are. Without them, I'm nothing." Nonlinear, don't ask.
1. Inspections

**Okay, just for the record, I only waited to type these out because I thought there was no point. Then I found out A had a Fanfic category and 10 minutes later here we are. This was all written down in my notebook, anyway. Here goes. **extremely B-like smile I'm picking up from…T?****

**-Tess**

**{ Spoomie Note: The only order these are in is the order that I got them from his head. }**

* * *

I am twelve. I am running through the halls with B letting everyone know through silent knocks on the door and hurried whispered words that about 75 yards behind us are the inspectors, and if you need to hide anything now is the time. B is nine, and he is already nailing rats to his walls. I am the only person who knows. In two months I will start breaking mirrors. This, I do not know.

When I knock on H's door, she does open it. I turn the knob, and it is locked. I have to kick it in. Inside, H is sitting on her bed, secreting away a syringe. I tell her to get her shit out of the way fast because the inspectors are on the way. Then I catch up with B and we keep running. We can hear Roger coming up the stairs on the other side of the corridor as we zoom up the other ones to the next floor. I'm not sure exactly how we're going to get back down without passing the inspectors, we may end up jumping off the roof. We'll just figure that out when it comes time.

We end up, in fact, just hiding in a broom closet until Roger and the other inspector go by on the top floor. We fly down the stairs, skipping two or three steps at the bottom of each flight. We run into B's room and collapse on the bed. We both start laughing.

**

* * *

**

Wow, okay. More to come! (lots more…)

**-Tess**


	2. Sparring practice

**Here goes with number two! I'm just so happy every time I bring up DeathNote character list and he's on there (on the top of the list, in fact), that SO rocks! xD One fun and slightly poetic thing I just made up:**

**What happens when you give a child unlimited resources but no parents,**

**Nine years of ju-justu training but no support,**

**a promise to a future but no emotions,**

**a stick but no carrot?**

**Why,**

**This, of course. :D**

* * *

I am fourteen and in sparring practice. I am fighting B, and he seems a bit preoccupied. About what, I am not sure I want to know. He's been…distant lately, and I'm a bit worried about him. But I figure I may as well use the opening so I kick upwards and break B's nose to the side like we've been taught. He dosen't even flinch I see him stop when he hears the snap. As the blood starts to pour, B puts his sleeve to his nose in an attempt to stop it. All this does is soak the hem and sleeve of his shirt in blood. He looked down at his hand, and then begin to lick the blood off, suck it out of the fabric of his shirt. When he finally notices me staring, he looks up and smiles at me. That smile of his that was always a bit to big. Then the teacher comes over and hands him a towel. I wait for a new sparring partner.

**

* * *

**

Shit, isn't it? This was origionaly in second person towards B. This stuff really stinks….if it stays this bad I'm sueing myself. See ya! ;)

-Tess Spoom


	3. Knocked Out

**Here we go! =D **

**I'm sorry it's been so long, I just had nowhere else to take this story when suddenly, this strikes me. This is my new standard for awesomeness in this story, and the mini-stories will stay this good. **_**Promise.**_

_**-**_**Tess Spoom**

**A's memories**

**Chapter 3**

**Knocked Out**

I am fourteen and going to…it was either dinner or a late class, when I trip. I have just enough time to look down and notice a length of translucent fishing wire catching the evening light, when someone jumps on my back and puts a length of cloth over my face. I am about to throw them off when I feel the cold sting of a syringe in my neck. I throw the person over me and flip over, but whatever the person just injected me with, it was powerful, and I can already feel the drug taking affect. I lose consciousness before I can get the shirt off my face.

I wake up six hours later I in the third floor broom closet, with a pounding headache. I sit up, only to feel a lightining bolt of pain shoot up my right arm. I look down and, for a moment, am frozen in shock.

It was a fork. A metal fork from the cafeteria that had clearly been doctored at the ends to go all the way through my hand and pin it to the floor. Spaced perfectly so that two of the prongs fit around my bones of my hand.

The little bastard.

I took a deep breath, held it, and pulled the fork out of my hand. It hurt like fire, I bit down on a knuckle to keep from screaming. I went to open the door, only to find it locked...from him inside. Why would someone put a lock on the inside of a broom closet? But on closer inspection of the lock, I saw what he had done. He'd manually removed the door handle fixture from the door and flipped it over. Just so he could lock it from the inside. I unlocked the door with my uninjured hand and didn't even attempt to understand. I ddin't really care about the why, at the moment, I was just thinking about how to fix it without a janitor noticing.

What I knew:

-B had ambushed me, drugged me, thrown me in a broom closet, put a fork through my hand, and then used that string trick to lock the door from the inside.

- He'd put enough premeditation into this to flip the door handle around and get the fishing wire ready. Not to mention steal a sedative from the infirmary.

- If he got caught for this, he would be put on lockdown for at least three months. I'd been gone for six hours, according to the big clock in the courtyard, which had just struck one, and at least one person was bound to notice the Number 1's absence. Also, the third floor broom closet door handle could be noticed as early as tomorrow morning, which meant I had to go back there and fix it tonight.

- I was an idiot for not seeing this coming. It was my fault this had happened in the first place. If I'd seen that fishing wire a little earlier I would be asleep and not hemorrhaging all over the place right now. I pulled my shirt over my head and wrapped it around my bleeding, swollen hand.

-Hiding the wounds in my hand was going to be a serious nuisance. It was October, and even then I couldn't justify wearing gloves inside, maybe I could pass it off as trying to start a trend, which was very unlike me. And that was if the swelling went down enough to make it possible to hide, or it didn't get infected and I had to go to the nurse or lose my hand, or possibly both if I waited for too long. The time to make a plan was coming, right now I needed to focus on the task at hand.

- I still had the fork, and if I had my way about it, it was going was going straight through B's windpipe.

I opened the door of B's room, and he was awake, as I had predicted. My voice was flat. "You," I said, "are going to die."

He just lolled his head in my general direction, so he was looking at me, and said nonchalantly, "You wouldn't kill me."

That was it. The flames of anger building in my stomach were fanned into full on bloodlust. I growled as I lunged, tackling the 12-year-old and grabbing his wrist, planning to give the little bastard a taste of his own medicine. But as I was about to pin his hand to his bedside table, he moved his hand enough for me to miss. Instead, the fork impaled his left ring finger in four places, burrowing deep within the bone.

He was still for a moment, and I managed to cover his mouth before he screamed.

"Did **that** jog your memory a little?" I asked in a perfectly even voice. I'd really just created more work for myself, I'd have to splint his finger later, but it was worth it.

He smiled at me; only he could, in a situation like this. "I have no clue what you're talking about."

I pulled the fork out with a twist; he had to hold back the scream by himself this time and fell over on to the floor, holding his finger. I took this moment to go into lecture mode while he recovered.

"What **the hell** were you thinking! I know you realize how much trouble could've gotten in, so why in Chirst's name did you decide to jeopardize yourself like that?what was the point? H about got kicked out for stealing stuff from the infirmary, and Roger is looking for an excuse to get rid of you!" I was almost talking to myself at this point, lecturing him never did any good, this was just an alternative to hurting him more. "Also, now I have to go back up there tonight and fix that door you messed up why?" That was actually a question and he knew it, but he just smiled and said. "Don't forget about putting a fork through your hand."

I rolled my eyes. "Yeah, that hurt, too." I said as I dropped my ruined shirt on his bed and opened the door to our shared bathroom. Still monomanus, I went through the first aid kit for absorption sponges and finger splint. "And that sounded like a confession."

He sat with his legs pulled up to his chest on the bed, his wounded arm hanging limply to one side, still smirking. "Not necessarily. I could've just been helping you summarize the situation, as that was what you seemed to be doing. The four gaping holes in your hand are hard to miss, so I could only assume…"

I wrapped my wounded hand in the sponges and held the whole thing down with some duct tape that was conveniently hanging off of one of B's bedposts. (That was the thing about his room, you never knew what you'd find in there, or weather or not it would eat you. It always smelled like rotting flesh, and it was never safe to go in barefoot.)

I found a square of aluminum that would make a passable finger splint and, closing the bathroom door, sat down on the foul-smelling bed and examined B's injured hand. He hissed when I touched it. Actually, he required more than a splint, his finger was shattered. But taking this to the nurse would mean explaining why there was a fork wound in B's finger. (_Yes, nurse. He was eating dinner and missed._) I took that and what was left of the tape over to the bed and continued, "Yes, but you're the only suspect. I can't think of anyone else who would bother putting all that preparation into kidnapping me and then not even taking me out of the building. Hold your breath. "He did, and I realigned his finger with a sharp tug, just enough to pull it out of its socket. He gasped. I put the metal plate on the outer side of his injured finger and wrapped it up along with his index and a pretty much hopeless prayer that it would heal straight. I couldn't remember who the saint of nursing was. B snickered, possibly from the pain. "Don't you-" another intake of breath, "feel so flattered?"

"No, no I don't." I finished his finger and set about my next job, fixing that door. I left both of the bathroom doors so I could still talk to him. I went into my by comparison unremarkable room and started poking around in the pile of crap under my bed that my Other Self always griped at me about for the glue gun. I'd found it and was in the process of shimming out from underneath my bed when I hear a _thunk_ from the mattress above me. I looked up to see B, stretched out for once, with his head under my pillow. "Can I just sleep in here with you?" the 12-year-old whined.

"No." I said. Where had this come from? I hadn't let him sleep in here since he was 10. "Now give me a knife. I've got to go fix more of your mess."

He pulled a knife from his pocket and tossed it to me without pulling his head out from underneath my pillow. "And do what, remove my jugular vein?"

"That would _cause_ mess," I said, grabbing the knife. "and if your still here when I get back I'm going to do worse than break your finger."

He flopped his arm in a dismissive motion, he knew I wouldn't. "Go, ahead. I like it better in here."

I'd had just about enough of this for one night. "God, fuck off, kid."

"Not even if you wanted it."

I sigh and slam my door.

**Endness! What do ya think? Like? Then review! Hate? Review! Want to kill me? Please review, I want to talk to you! : ) I DO read reviews, people! I have nothing better to do!**

**Oh, I just rent round and played with the new Story Stats thing, and I was blown over by the countries of the people that have read my stuff! There was one person who read Spoomey Story that's from a country whose name I can't pronounce! Someone from China read a Death Note fic, and Death Note is illegal in China! (not kidding) Someone from France read THIS fic! Thanks, French person! xD **

**-Tess Spoom**


	4. How do you do it?

**Yet another chapter. God, I have written nothing on FB since the end of last year. **smacks self** Anyway, here's this.**

**Random Note of Randomness: This little scene was first part of another fanfiction that ended up on the cutting room floor, then part pf this three-scene thing that turned into a two-scene thing because this didn't really fit. **

**What are you doing? Ignore my stupid ANs and read, woman, READ! :) **

**-Tess **

**A's memories**

**Chapter four**

**How do you do it?**

"How do you do it?"

B stared at the older child. B was nine, making A twelve, and he was watching blood drip down his older roommate's arm onto the floor, the towel placed there absorbing the blood so it wouldn't stain the carpet. Even breaking down, he remained a neat-freak...

A, obviously, was shocked to hear the kid on the bed behind him. Sure, he'd been a little preoccupied, but he hadn't heard the kid open the door or jump up on the bed and that thing was damn _squeaky._ He was getting too silent, A had to do better…

"Go the fuck away, kid."

"You have hardly any room to call me kid, you know. You barely hit puberty yourself." He stared at A, not going anywhere, not blinking. Sure, it had scared him the first time he had walked in on A doing this, but he was a lot older now, and blood didn't scare him. Never had, actually… "Now tell me, how do you cut yourself like that?"

The twelve-year-old was half-delirious from blood loss and in no mood. "With a razor, dumbass. You can steal one from the art room if you want to try it so badly." He waved the razor in B's face. Why the hell was he in here, anyway?

A interested B when he was like this. Not thinking clearly enough to be completely rational, not strong enough to hit him or toss him out, his words just a little slurred. It left him so vulnerable, B could probably do almost anything he wanted to to his senior of three years and get away with it…aside from that, this was the best time to get information out of the normally stoic older boy. Any other time he would just ignore him if he tried to ask this question. "No, I mean, how do you do it without crying? Doesn't that **hurt**?" He stared down at the long, deep lacerations in A's right arm, which was completely dyed a deep sanguine red with still more blood spilling out to deepen the color. Pretty, almost…

A was at a loss for how to answer him. Sure, it'd hurt like hell the first time he'd done it, but there was something else, too….

The very fact that A couldn't find a word to describe happiness says a lot about the type of person he was. After a couple of seconds, he came up with an answer. "Pain triggers the release of endorphins, so it doesn't hurt near as much as it looks like it does."

"So….you're a masochist, then? What, do you get a rise from that or something?" A winced, then glared at the kid. God, the sick little bastard. Well, B being his perverted self, what did he expect him to take from that statement? A didn't have the energy or the equilibrium to smack the younger boy at the moment, so he just mustered the most venomous glare he could and said "Fuck off, kid."

"See, that's what I thought you were doing-

"GO AWAY!"

B just giggled and leaned out of the way of the jerking hand containing a razor blade. He jumped off the bed and retreated to his own room, then. In case he had pissed the boy off badly enough that he actually decided to come after him…provided he could get up off the ground without falling over.

**Argh…I think this had a point when I started it, maybe it'll make sense when I write more…..**

**And I apologise for the third person POV in this one, I like A's POV a lot better and the rest of the story is written that way, it just only works when A is lucid enough to write from. **

**Right. Seeya! ;)**

-**Tess Spoom**


	5. H

**Hey, folks. It's Tess. I'm at home, alone, on a Saturday night, so here's a new chapter for you. Enjoy. :43**

**NOTE: This chapter contains an OC in a major role. Before you set me on fire and go all "MARY SUE DIE!" give us a chance, kay? A's basically a canon-OC anyway, in half of the fanfictions on FN he's a girl….**

**So, anyway, don't kill us yet! Wait until she actually gets involved in the plot two chapters from now! THEN** **kill me!** : )

**Let the chapter begin!**

**Disclaimer: Honestley, after years of you reading these do I REALLY NEED ONE? I can't think of any fanfiction writer (that wasn't writing Vampire Chronicles fanfiction) that's ever been sued for thier work. We're NOT taking credit, we're NOT making money, so why would book companies want to sue us? The internet killed the Copyright Protection Act anyway. The tagline of fanfic should be this: "_ The FanFic website - Copyright? What Copyright?"_**

**So, in case I still need to say it, I OWN NOTHING. **

**((5/31/10 I fixed this chapter and re-uploaded it. Now it is significantly less retarded. Sorry I took so long, school, personal stuff, excuses excuses. Forgive me my previous shite as I offer up this instead.))**

**A's memories**

**Chapter 6**

**H**

I am ten, and I am watching my little brother fight a thirteen-year-old girl.

I usually made a point to stay out of his fights, only stepping in and pulling him out by his hair if a teacher was coming or it looked like he was going to kill the kid he was beating up. In both of these cases he would wind up in trouble if I didn't step in, and I didn't need that.

I leaned against the wall, far away from the small crowd(all of whom, for the most part, were sensibly silent.) One ear trained outside the door and reading. I looked up occasionally, only long enough to see who was winning. I wanted no part in this. B tryed, in vain, to knock the girl's legs out from under her with a kick. She caught his leg and sent him flying, he got his feet under him just in time. I don't know how it started, I had been reading when I heard a yell of indignation in a tone I recognized. B did this from time to time, now being the fourth. He gave no warning, getting the inclination and just as suddenly punching the next person he came across without a teacher's presence.

As the fight went on, my eyes wondered to the girl's face. Until now, the only opinion I'd had of her was casual contempt. What was she doing, fighting someone six years younger than her? How many belts was she ahead of B? That was just childish. But, when I looked, I noticed her face, which changed the situation immediately.

Her face was curled into a snarl, her lips pulled up over her teeth like a dog. Her long brown hair was swirling behind her with every movement she made. But what caught my attention were her eyes. Her green eyes were like a rabid cat's, and a mad joy burned in them that made the hair on the back of my neck stand up. I'd only ever seen that out of one other person, who this girl happened to be fighting. It occurred to me, for the first time, that B might be fighting someone he could actually lose against. One thing I'd never been worried about when he got a violent impulse and decided to take it out on another human being was his well-being. Whatever he lacked against his chosen opponent in skill he made up for in ruthlessness, he was never unwilling to invert a kneecap or try to gouge an eye out, given the opening. I usually had to step in when it looked like he was about to kill the person. He'd been to Rodger's office for fighting before, officially putting himself on the 'trouble student' radar as early as six. I had already decided to put an end to the fighting once and for all once this one was over with, but-

B was half the age of the person he was fighting, he was faster, but she was bigger and stronger. His reach was shorter and only one in three of his punches actually landed. He ducked her arms and legs and pulled her back by her hair, but he was tiring, and this couldn't go on forever. The fire in his eyes was going out, her eyes burned on. B was losing. This set off warning flags immediately, B usually came near eviscerating the people he fought, and this girl was proving herself worse than B, at least in this case. This was when I put my book down and got within intervening-distance of the episode. I watched for a few moments, before the girl knocked B to the ground and whipped a metal object out of her pocket. It caught so much of the light coming in the window that I wasn't sure what it was, but it was about to be lodged in B's neck.

The crowd saw, and a few of them actually cared enough to run forward, but I, having been ready for it, was there first. I whipped her head back by her downright impractical mass of hair and pulled the first thing from my pocket that felt sharp, holding it to her throat, right above her racing pulse. I met her eyes, which betrayed only shock. Then I realized what was in my hand, against her throat. A plastic knife. I was holding the girl hostage with a plastic dining room knife. But she didn't seem to notice. She couldn't see that the knife at her throat was plastic, it could just as easily be a metal serrated one. I stopped the blink of shock before it got to my eyes and kept my mouth a line. Bluffing is easy; it's all about-self control.

She didn't struggle, she just stared at me. The emotions in her eyes were mixed, but indignation seemed dominant. She dropped to her knees, unable to keep the stance I'd pulled her into. B was still on the floor, face completely blank, just watching. "B, go." I growled, trying to make it clear he was getting it for this later. "**Now.**"

He did as he was told for once, getting up and walking out, ducking through the crowd. I couldn't see the expression on his face, but I would deal with him later. He always sulked when I broke up his fights, and this defeat was going to hang over him like a cloud for at least a few days. But I still had an armed hostage in my arms and looking away from her for long periods of time would signal an opening for escape, my eyes flicked back to the girl almost immediately.

I tightened my hold on her neck with the plastic dining room knife, "Drop it. Now." Exactly what it was, I didn't know at the moment, but I didn't want it buried in my small intestine. She rolled her eyes, the dominant emotion on her face was amusement now. She smiled at me, and it was then I knew she planned to attack me with it. She seemed too cocky for someone with a knife at her throat, she knew I wouldn't actually hurt her with it, even if I did have a vested stake in what was going on and hadn't just interceded on the part of my impulsive little brother. I wouldn't ruin my chances at a future as L by killing someone at ten years old. It had been a stupid, impulsive bluff to begin with, and I was lucky it had gotten me as far as it had. Maybe this meant I didn't do well under stress…I needed to work on that. The hand that was keeping her head back came up and caught her wrist and pulled the sewing needle from her hand, then wrenched her arm until it was jammed against the socket and she couldn't move it. I put a foot against her back and kicked. The crowd, which had been beginning to disperse, paid attention again. She didn't put up much of a fight this time, either, just standing back up and staring at me, smiling in an almost friendly way. Her eyes dropped to the plastic knife that was still in my left hand. She snorted. "A lunch knife? Really?"

I was silent. She just gave me a calculating look and said, "I'm H."

I threw her the sewing needle and left the room, pausing to stare at the crowd, frozen in shock. I hate audiences. "For God's sakes, go away. You're lucky this didn't attract any teachers…"

B was waiting for me about halfway to the room, crouched unobtrusively in the corner of the stairwell like some kind of gargoyle. Her had a huge bruise on his forehead that would be next to impossible to cover up, and from the way he was putting most of his weight on one leg he probably had a twisted ligament there. I held out a hand to him as I came by, curious to his reaction. Before now, he'd just sulked as obtrusively as possible when I broke up his fights, but this time I saved him from a needle in his jugular.

I half-expected him to be angry, the other half to just sulk, like he had been that last time I'd split up one of his fights. Instead he looked up, ignoring my hand, and smiled incredulously at me. "A plastic knife?" he asked in that prepubescent voice of his, trying to suppress a giggle. He stood up without my help, keeping part of his weight off his left leg.

I smacked him in the back of the head, but lighter than usual. He was pretty beaten up as it was. "I saved you life with it. At least be a little grateful."

He shrugged noncommittally. "I doubt it. But, she **is** a basket-case, sooo…"

"What, you know her?" I'd actually never heard of an H in the school. I'd supposed they just hadn't gotten around to naming someone that, yet. They didn't really go in order. The second person in the House after me had been christened E, for Eve. Adam and Eve, for something totally new on the face of the earth. I'd had no parience with it. The idea seemed pretentious and I didn't like the name Adam.

"No," B said, "but you hear things."

How exactly he'd 'heard things' when the only person he really spoke with was me I didn't know, but once again I didn't really care. Just another random person to deal with. I would do her the courtesy of staying the hell out of her way if she stayed the hell out of mine.

I was wrong.

She was in and out of my life like a ghost after that for a number of years. My next memory of her came nearly three years later.

I am still twelve, but my birthday is coming up in about three weeks. I've been tearing my arms open for maybe nine months now, and losing consciousness from blood loss is something I'm very familiar with. This constant screwing over of my immune system starting to take a toll on more than my nerve endings, which are already dead in most parts of both my arms. I've lost 35 pounds in the last seven months and gotten pneumonia twice, giving me a downright emaciated look. Add that to my 5'4 stature and the dark rings I've had around my eyes for as long as I can remember due to my chronically fucked up study schedule and I look like a stick figure with AIDS. B's gotten a laugh over it at my expense many times. Right now I am half-catatonic, laying on a towel covered in my blood and floating in and out of consciousness while staring up at my whitish spray-Styrofoam ceiling, which keeps changing colors. I wish it would stop.

The next time I drift back to reality, there is a face in front of mine. I can't tell who it is at first so, naturally assuming the face was B, try to kick it in the stomach. I'm pretty sure that all I accomplish is causing my leg to twitch. The giggle it emits as it steps back is singularly female in tone, and when I focus I can see a lot of brown hair. This shocked me at the time, scince I was sure I had locked both doors, but I wasn't really in a position to do anything about it. I didn't remember who she was at then, but when she dropped a cold towel on my head instead of gutting me, I was grateful. I actually fall asleep then, slightly against my will. I didn't even know that was her until a couple of years later, when she brought it up.

For years she was just a person in the background, another overworked face in the back of my classes. Then suddenly, something changed. Suddenly, you heard her voice during free periods. She was smiling, hanging all over other kids. She looked….happy. Whatever had happened to her, it was out of place, and even stranger when I saw it in person. One of the people she decided to fixate on was me, I'll never know why. She had maybe six or seven people she stalked, she called them all her 'babies'. I ignored her for a very long time, thinking how much easier it had been to deal with the sullen ghost she'd existed as before. (Being thirteen, it disturbed be slightly that the idea of a pretty girl following me around held no draw to me…maybe it was just because she was so annoying.) I was first in line, and had better things to do than put up with a random person who'd decided out of the blue one day to follow me around that wasn't B. Her stubbornness alone is almost what led me to like her. She refused to stop stalking me until I said something to her, and this went on for **months.** At some point, it was either give in and speak with her every now and then or lose it and snap her neck. And, not feeling like being turned over to the police for murder in the second degree over something this stupid, I forced myself to give in. So the next time she materialized beside me at a point in the day and asked me what I was doing I gave her an answer.

"My new book came. I was seeing how much of it I can do without paper." I pulled the cover up so she could see it, but I didn't look up from the problem. I'd already almost lost part of it just trying to answer her, and was questioning my own judgment about this already. _Just get it over with just get it over with…._She stare over my shoulder at the workbook and whistled. "Gauss's formula stuff? I'm not there yet." _Well no shit. I'm first in line and your eighteenth meaning that I'm much more intelligent than you, which explains why their having workbooks tailored for me and B by a Chinese company instead of keeping us with the lesson plan for the rest of the school. And in case you can't already tell, I'm trying to work, and this book is due on Ms. Hill's desk in two weeks. If B has any sense he's in his room doing the same thing I'm doing right now. __**I'm busy. **_"Really?"

She seemed to have caught the not-so-subtle sarcasm in my voice, because she had dropped the line of conversation and was rifling through my things now, extracting _Coming Up for Air _from the pile of books to my right. "Orwell, huh? Do you like it so far?"

I scribbled what I had of the equation in the workbook, and resigned myself to getting this over with. "It's taking for too long to establish a single point. He's taking the perceived decline of human society and beating the reader to death with it."

"Is the theme all you see in it? I've always liked George, he's so full of vices and yet so at home with himself, it's just so disgusting." She pulled a chair up as she said this, barley containing her grin at getting a workable response out of me.

"Character development has never really been Orwell's strongpoint."

She giggled. "You didn't answer the question."

I sat there and talked about Orwell with her for half an hour. Whatever had happened to H, it had turned her into a person unlike any I'd ever met. Eventually, many more conversations later, I grew to like her. I never told her this, I grew to see her as a sister the same way that I saw B as my brother. She was an intelligent, compassionate, caring person, not entirely a stalker, and her mental instabilities notwithstanding.

Later, I realized why I loved talking with her so much; she expected nothing of me. I was B's caretaker, I was constantly on guard around him. And being in Rodger's presence was the same as being in my own, I was constantly being watched, from all sides, for any imperfection. I knew this. I knew that I had to be perfect, and I would be. Every day was another step towards becoming the person I needed to be to do what I was born to do. The cutting was nothing, just a way to relieve stress. As long as it didn't interfere with my studies, it didn't matter. H gave me a place where the world wasn't on my shoulders.

What does this prove other than everything I had learned? About why L has to be a symbol, Justice itself, and can't have connections. Personal affection is a luxury you can only have after your enemies are eliminated. Until then, everyone you love is a hostage, sapping your courage and corrupting your judgment. I saw this coming, I **let** it happen. And now all I've done is seal my own failure. Because Justice doesn't feel pain, or loss. And Justice doesn't mourn.

* * *

**So there's that. In case you haven't noticed, these chapters are nonlinear as fuck, so expect more H in the future. **

**-Tess **

**((ah, that bit of random lyricism A spouts right at the end is credit to Oroson Scott Card. As to where I got it...I plead the fifth amendment.))**

**P.S: I tried to put this up on my DeviantArt account, l and discovered the literature posting program on DA is, in fact, a bitch. -_- Anyway bye! ;)**


End file.
